I Met A Man

Driving home from my shabby cottage on Cape Cod after pouring anti-freeze in the plumbing, I decided to visit a gallery along the way I had always passed and knew that my wife-in-law had shown some art there and thought to check it out. The owner was a trifle heavy, sitting at a computer, and he muttered a hello and I muttered a hello back, probably relieved that he was not more friendly but still critical of the cold greeting. The space was big enough for all styles of painting and since it was primarily landscapes, worked at close quarters. You can't really see art in a hurry, but some of the work caught my attention like seeds that cling to your clothes in the brush. Eventually I broke the ice and mentioned that my wife had exhibited there the past summer. He said there was a lot of interest in her work but no sales. It seemed to puzzle him. We talked a bit about artists and their motives and skill at pricing until we drifted into a Dooms Day conversation that grew out of the purpose of art and the decline of good taste, culture, America, and the world. It was one of those conversations where the talkers are manouverig through a formula that has worked more than once in conversations with strangers and carries the effort until each feels safe enough to take the risk of real content. The portly man had been a museum director and left when it had become a fundraising job over a curator of a collection job. The usual problems with a rich board of directors who see how other institutions are getting funding and their man should do the same or better. Eventiually we drifted into life in the United States and politics/cutlure.
He mentioned that the founding fathers represented a small population so that citizens had three of these founders per one million people and now we could have nine hundred of these great minds if the same forces were at work in America. "Where are they? ", he asked. Neither of us knew. In their absence we discussed the economic, political, scientific community as the cause of our disappearing sense of freedom as seen in the watching our communications,movements, purchases, conversations, and health condition through electronic means that most Americans must use or are exposed to. The fear of a totalitarian country by default was coming, if not already here, because of our willingness and sometimes our choosing to subordinate those rights in the interests of convenience or safety with fear of terrorism as the basis for this acceptence. Needless to say,this was a harrowing conversation and we both managed to avoid names or political parties. We knew who we were talking about. As the conversation wound down and we return to softer subjects such as how he named his gallery, we both acknowledged that shared conversations were of this kind were important and that we would both give some private thought to our exchange and perhaps do something about the future now. I am working on it.